The Government must address a gap in the charity framework, namely the exemption for religious charities having to be transparent about the benefits they receive.

There is a simple principle at the heart of the charity framework: in exchange for public benefit, the community confers public subsidy. Registered charities receive income tax exemption, fringe benefits tax concessions and GST benefits. What the community receives in return is transparency – the ability to see how those publicly subsidised assets are raised, held and deployed. The basic religious charity (BRC) exemption breaks that bargain.

Under the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission Act 2012, a basic religious charity enjoys exemptions unavailable to any other registered charity. It need not answer financial questions in its Annual Information Statement, lodge annual financial reports or comply with ACNC Governance Standards. The Commissioner cannot remove or replace its responsible persons. These are not minor administrative differences. They are categorical immunities from the disclosure regime every other charity – however small, however local – must observe.

The tax concessions, meanwhile, apply in full. The financial benefits of charitable status flow without qualification; the transparency obligations do not. This asymmetry was a deliberate political accommodation made a generation ago, before a Royal Commission documented in forensic detail the governance failures of the institutions most likely to rely on it.

Last week the Assistant Minister for Charities, Andrew Leigh MP, addressed the National Press Club. He made a serious and welcome contribution. The Minister spoke........

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